April X-Wing – LEGO Star Wars Magazine, April 2023

The LEGO Star Wars magazine lately seems to have taken a turn to the dark side, that is it has become very minifigure centric. You know, those surveys asking whether one prefers buildable spaceships or minifigures seem to have had an effect. I always favored buildable extras, which I know inevitably put me in the minority. Most would simply have the same Stormtrooper a hundred times than a single TIE-Fighter. For me this kinda sucks, so I’m even more happy that at least for the April 2023 issue we’re getting something based on studs and not just a tiny mannequin.

The first comic once more delves into the goings-ons of a Stormtrooper‘s mundane everyday life inside The First Order, which is all well and good, but still makes me cringe.

The second comic is more in line with what I would expect. It pokes some fun at Yoda living in a swamp and Luke crashing his X-Wing there. You know, it’s based on established lore, but with a twist and that comment about Luke possibly needing a dry stand for his clothes is in fact genuinely funny.

the posters are very graphical, which in my world is always a plus. The front has yet again Vader asking to join The Empire and the back has Bo Katan set against some imperial troopers.

The extra is an X-Wing for like the hundredth time, but since the actual build is always slightly different I’m not complaining too much. I just wish they’d occasionally go for the lesser known variants of other pilots with different color schemes and not always for the main ones piloted by Luke. The model is in fact quite similar to the currently available polybag version (30654), only slightly smaller and with less pieces. I didn’t pick up the polybag or else I could have offered a direct comparison.

This is by no means the most exciting issue of this mag, but it’s okay overall. It would really be nice to get a few more innovative vehicle builds, though. With so much new stuff having come out in the last three years or so I’m surprised we’re still stuck with repeats based on the movies. I can’t imagine why it should be so hard to do a Ferrix attack shuttle or an N-1 Fighter from The Mandalorian.

V is Victory? – LEGO Star Wars Magazine, April 2021

WordPress are driving me crazy with their forced transition to the Blocks editor, so bear with me if some things look a bit wonky. As an old school WP user I’m still too much used to working within a theme’s design rules and this new-fangled stuff takes some getting used to. Anyway, here we go again with the LEGO Star Wars magazine, this time for April 2021.

Unlike the wildly fictional concoctions in the last few issues, the comic is a bit more relatable again this time, depicting several encounters Yoda had/ has while roaming the forests of Dagobah. This is very akin to Luke‘s training in The Empire Strikes Back with all sorts of dangerous creatures and a force representation of Darth Vader also making an appearance. Of course there are some liberties here, but at least I like to believe that’s how it could have happened. I’m not an advocate of strict canon, but familiarity and adherence to existing the lore and rules of the Star Wars universe is always a bonus.

The posters deserve praise this month. Not only are they stylistically similar to the Storm Trooper chart from last month, but also both of them are actually good. To top it off, they even tell a story with Luke and Vader facing each other as exploded minifigures. Of course the downside to that is that you will actually have to buy two magazines if you want to put up both posters in the way depicted here.

The extra is a V-Wing fighter. Don’t ask me too much, as I have yet to manage to actually consistently watch The Clone Wars and catch up with its story and details, but apparently these fighters appear quite a lot there and are kind of important. Otherwise LEGO might have glossed over them and not done several models, obviously. as far as I know this is the first time it has been done as such a mini-model, though, so it’s something new.

The build is not particularly elaborate, but seems to capture the shapes well enough. The highlight are of course the Dark Red shield tiles, which so far only have appeared in the UCS A-Wing Starfighter (75275) and the smaller LEGO Super Heroes Hulkbuster (76164) set, making them a bit of a rarity item. The same goes for the curved slope, though it isn’t quite as scarce. On top of it you get five (!) full left/ right pairs of the 2 x 4 wedge tiles in Light Bluish Grey. Not a bad yield for such a small model!

On a funny side note, I was immediately reminded of Nintendo‘s Starfox games when I accidentally whacked the vertical air foils out of alignment. The details would need some refinement, naturally, but it’s surprising how similar the fighters look.

On the whole this is a fantastic issue providing some good value. A decent comic, some superb posters and a model that despite its simplicity looks cool. what more can you ask for? The only thing where it falls short is the activities/ puzzles, which are few and far inbetween…